Catching Up
by sparou
Summary: What if Sasuke hadn't won?


"Still not talking to me, Sasuke?"

The young man's hair is dirty, and obscured by the dim light of the shack, but anyone could tell it used to be a vibrant blond. It falls into his eyes as he squats to lean his head against the door.

"You can't ignore me forever, you know," he grumbles to the splintering wood. "You could never ignore me for long. I'm too annoying, remember? Always 'dobe, you talk too much,' 'dobe, you're too clumsy'--dobe, dobe, dobe. Don't tell me even putting down lesser men is below the great Uchiha Sasuke now."

The door offers as little response as its room's occupant. The blond young man scowls, twitching.

"Right, right. I forgot. Everything's below you now, isn't it? Your village, your companions, your _teammates_--jesus, Sasuke, I still don't understand! How could you think to just leave everything like that? How could you--"

The young man breaks off abruptly, lowering his head. When it comes up again, a toothy grin stretches his mouth.

"Heheh. I promised myself I wouldn't ask you that question anymore, after your bullshit answers the first time. See how much of an asshole you are? You can get people worked up enough to break promises just by ignoring them. Maybe it's a birth defect..."

The grin widens.

"But then, I guess karma's come to bite your ass for it now, eh, Sasuke? Seeing as I'm not the one on the locked side of this door, waiting for reinforcements to drag me back to Konoha."

A cocky laugh.

"All those times I warned you I was going to catch up, and when it came down to it, you still didn't believe I'd win..."

The young man's grin abruptly fades, as if recalling something troubling.

"Sasuke, I--I didn't come here to talk about that."

He draws a hand through his gritty hair and smiles strainedly.

"I caught another hare today. They're all over the place, up here where no one lives. It cooked up really well--don't laugh. I know my stew technique's still not the best, but it's is getting better, it _is_!"

The young man's throat bobs.

"This is getting stupid. I know you're depressed or angsting or whatever shit you always pull, but Sasuke, you need to eat."

Stony silence from beyond the door. Annoyance seems to rise in the young man again, but he makes a visible effort to still it.

"Do you think refusing to eat is going to make me pity you or something? Because I swear, if you think I'm dumb enough to waste that on an asshole like you..."

The young man sets his jaw and twists round to slump with his back to the door, swiping vengefully at a passing fly.

"Dammit. Sometimes I think Pervert-Sennin was right, calling you fancy clan-name genius types a bunch of useless dicks."

A beat. His expression darkens.

"What, not even a rebuke to that, Sasuke? An insult to your precious Uchiha name? That's what you left for, wasn't it? That's what you rejected _us_ for, wasn't it? To go--to go and sleep with your goddamn ghosts?"

The young man clenches a fist, trembling, and twists up and around to slam it against the door. He shouts into the wood.

"Listen to me--it's _wrong_, Sasuke! It's _wrong_ to hold onto the dead! They were your precious people then, fine, but they're gone. Understand? Gone! It's not fair, it's--you've got no _right_ to give yourself to them, not when you've got precious people left alive, not when you're--_you're_ a precious person to those you're leaving behind--!"

His voice breaks, and it's loud in the silence, but he only snarls and slams his fist into the door again.

"What about us, Sasuke? What about the people who need you? Who _need you_?"

The young man's fist goes through the door with a crunch of rotten wood splintering.

He goes very still.

"Sasuke...why is there water on the floor?"

With a jerk, he pulls his fist back out. His knuckles drip dark liquid in the dim light.

"_Fuck_! Sasuke, did you hurt yourself?"

Shooting to his feet, the young man jerks the bar from the broken door and shoves it open.

"Sasuke--jesus, Sasuke, you're bleeding like crazy!"

He stumbles across the dark room to kneel.

"Oh Shit, oh shit. You reopened the wound I gave you, didn't you? You stupid bastard! That was a serious injury! I told you not to move!"

The young man's hands are shaking. He bats distractedly at a fly by his head.

"Let me--let me bandage it again. It's not too late. We can stop the bleeding. Let me just--here, if I rip up my jacket--if I just tie it around--"

The sound of tearing fabric and frantic motion.

"Stick with me, come on stick with me, Sasuke--god, it's so dark I can hardly see, I--just a little bit more, and--jesus, why are there so many flies in here--if you could just lift up so I can slide it beneath you--stick with me, you've got to stick with me, I _need_ you--there, now the second one and--why, Sasuke, why didn't you listen to me? I told you it was a serious injury. The Rasengan is a serious jutsu. Why didn't you believe me?"

Sudden silence. The buzzing of flies and the slither of cloth dropping to the floor.

"All those times I warned you I'd catch up. Why didn't you believe I'd beat you, when it came down to it?"

The sound of a twisted sob. The young man bursts into motion, grabbing unresponsive shoulders and shaking viciously.

"Why did you have to use the Chidori? Why did you have to make me do it? Why--oh god, even at that last moment, even looking straight into your eyes, I could tell you still thought you had time to dodge. Even as it went right through your spine, and I couldn't stop, and there was so much blood, but I could see into your eyes and I could tell you still didn't believe it was--_why didn't you believe I'd beat you, Sasuke_? Come on, answer me! ANSWER ME!"

The young man chokes and stills. His panting breath rings ragged in the dark.

Slowly, his clenched hands gentle, stroking cold skin placatingly. His voice goes husky and low.

"Sorry. Sorry, I--"

He distractedly shoos the flies off an ice-pale cheek.

"That was stupid. I know you're injured. I won't do that again, just--"

His fingers curl in hair long ago matted stiff with blood.

"Won't you say something? Please?"

He begins to rock.

"You can't ignore me forever, you know. You could never ignore me for long, remember? Sasuke?"

The young man's hair is dirty, and obscured by the dim light of the shack, as he curls around a lifeless body with only the buzzing flies as witness. But if you look close, you can tell it used to be a vibrant blond.


End file.
